Whether an appellant under Sec. 18 of SARFAESI Act, 2002 is mandatorily required to pre-deposit even when the challenge is against an interlocutory order not touching the merits of the case and not deciding the rights of parties – Archana Nirman Pvt. Ltd. and Another Vs. IIFL Home finance Ltd. Corporate Office and others – Calcutta High Court
Hon’ble Calcutta High Court held that:
(i) The requirement of a pre-deposit for preferring an appeal is not an instrument of oppression against the appellant but one of the checks and bounds to curtail the tendency to prefer frivolous appeals.
(ii) The pre-deposit accompanies preference of an appeal against an adjudication which has already been done by the first forum. Thus, it cannot be said that the provision is intrinsically oppressive, onerous or absurd.
(iii) A statute is only read down in order to give maximum effect to the intention of the legislature in enacting the same, as gathered from the composite reading of the entire Act and to crease out absurdities. In the present case, however, nothing in the rest of the statute justifies such a reading down, since the intention of the legislature in promulgating the Act is not curbed but enhanced by imposition of the pre-condition since the object and purpose of the statute is primarily to streamline the recovery proceeding and expedite the same against unscrupulous borrowers.
